Praesidenten is a film about the crucial conflict
between the (conservative) codes of society and individual moral.

It tells the story of a grandfather, father and son of a well respected family
who all make the same mistake and fall in love with a common girl.

They all have to resolve the problem in a way acceptable to the society they
live in but must consequently suffer the inner guilt that inevitably follows.

Finally, late in his life the son, whose a respected judge in a small town, gets
a chance to redeem himself and his ancestors by doing the right thing morally
but also severely breaking the law in doing so.

This highlights the conflict between the personal and the societal spheres of
right and wrong in a spectacular way, especially as Dreyer depicts the other
local men of power as only concerned with how the incident would affect their
status in society.

Dreyer uses flashback- structure in a very efficient and economical way to build
the comparisons between the different times portrayed in the film. Furthermore:
in this our digital age of fast editing and overflow of image it is most
gratifying to see a film that has a complex point to make and manages to do that
almost effortlessly with a minimum of "hassle". The direction is so economic it
almost hides the mastery of cinematic vision behind it to the untrained eye.

• 55
second fragment of the lost film "Penage" (screenplay by Dreyer)
• Carl Dreyer Biography
• Carl Dreyer Filmography

DVD Release Date: January 10th, 2005Keep Case
Chapters: 12

Comments:

The release of Dreyer's first film on DVD is quite
a momentous occasion. It's never been available on VHS or DVD anywhere
previously, and is only usually seen theatrically at rare Dreyer
retrospectives. This DFI DVD is recommended for anyone keen to see this
very rare film, but unfortunately, it isn't reference quality or the
definitive DVD release of the film that it perhaps could have been.

First of all - the film. It's fascinating. Within the first few minutes
are unusual shots of small children trying to clamber down broken ruins,
closeups of frogs leaping, and lovely outdoors shots of lovers on a
lake, kissing in a boat (reminiscent of DAY OF WRATH). After this quick
paced, fresh, Vigo-like start - the film settles down a bit after a
30-year jump into the future, and Dreyer fans will have a treat spotting
stylistic traits and decor that looks straight out of THE PASSION OF
JOAN OF ARC and ORDET. I won't delineate the plot, however, let me just
add that any fans of Dreyer out there should strive to pick this up ---
it's unlikely we'll see another DVD of this film for many years.

The problems with the disc are to do with the 1999 film restoration and
the transfer of it to DVD. First of all, the film restorer (Marguerite
Engberg) replaced all the original Danish intertitles with dual-language
(Danish and English) pages. Unfortunately, these new intertitle pages
feature writing that is far too small. Furthermore, when the intertitles
are depicting handwritten letters that a character is reading, a
"script" font is used which is illegible. The print used is quite
contrasty, as you can see from the shots. I doubt that Dreyer intended
the film to have such a pronounced chiaroscuro look with hardly any
shadow detail, but the intertitles are the main problem here: they
shimmer with chroma noise and look very "analogue".

Ideally, the film needs a new film restoration, preserving the original
Danish intertitles (if possible) and a better transfer -- but the
problem is one of cost and the DFI have issued what they have available
to them.

So I recommend it, with caveats, because there's no other version likely
for years. It's a great film, a master's debut, and of huge interest.